


Slip and Fall

by AirgiodSLV



Category: The Lord of the Rings RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2003-08-01
Updated: 2003-08-01
Packaged: 2019-07-20 09:09:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 757
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16134134
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AirgiodSLV/pseuds/AirgiodSLV
Summary: He’s always in love. It’s just the way he is; a romantic, someone in love with love itself. It grounds him, gives him a center of balance, a point of reference. Usually it manifests as infatuation; desperately longing, like a schoolboy with a crush, for something he can’t have.





	Slip and Fall

**Author's Note:**

> This story is dedicated to semicolons and my editor Cyndi, without which I would be lost.

Blue eyes catch his across the set, catch and hold in spite of the busy crew members, actors, and technical consultants crossing between them. And Dominic’s breath catches in his chest, somewhere near his heart, and he thinks that he may have made a mistake.

He’s always in love. It’s just the way he is; a romantic, someone in love with love itself. It grounds him, gives him a center of balance, a point of reference. Usually it manifests as infatuation; desperately longing, like a schoolboy with a crush, for something he can’t have.

Because he chooses very carefully the objects of his affection. He doesn’t want the messy tangle and complications of a relationship; he just wants to be in love. Relationships take too much time, too much emotional investment; besides, he’s never in one place for long enough to build one.

Dominic doesn’t want to commit, he just wants that giddy feeling of having someone be the center of his universe. Someone who he can watch and listen to and spend time with. Someone who, for the span of a few weeks or a month, makes his heart beat just a little bit faster. Someone who is utterly oblivious to Dominic’s attentions.

That’s one of the main requirements. Dominic has very high standards; he only falls for near-perfection, for beauty and grace and charm and wit, for something that is almost impossible for him to achieve. Because that is the most important stipulation of Dominic’s romances: they have to be unrequited. Otherwise the safety of infatuation is lost, and he starts risking a relationship.

This time, he thinks he might have slipped up.

He should have known better. He’s certainly done this often enough to know the rules, but this time is different. This time it’s getting dangerously close to the real thing.

There are a variety of reasons. First, the length of the shoot. He doesn’t usually have to spend a year-and-a-half in the same place, with the same people. With the same object of desire. Second, casts don’t usually click into place as fast as this one did, and almost never become this close.

And finally, the object of the crush is supposed to remain ignorant, unavailable, unattainable. Dominic usually picks the straight guys; or the ones in serious long-term relationships; or those in denial about their sexuality; or the boys who are still young enough that it’s all about sex, and love is still an abstract idea.

Elijah was supposed to belong to the latter category, young and pretty and naïve. Dominic selected him in part because he looked too innocent and childlike to be a threat. He discovered his mistake within a week, when Elijah got into a discussion on philosophy with Sir Ian, and then took on Viggo over a challenge of some sort regarding theories of modern art. Dominic had taken one look at him, flushed with enthusiasm and clutching a bottle of fruit juice (with which he gestured to support his points), wide-eyed and articulate and so beautiful it hurt to look at him, and knew that he was in trouble.

He should have picked Orlando. He knows that now, now that it’s too late to save himself. Orlando would have noticed, but he would have simply gone in for some good-natured teasing and let Dominic adore him. Orlando is used to being wanted, but he also knows what it’s like to want. He would have allowed Dominic the fantasy.

Instead, Dom has chosen Elijah, and is only now realizing what a mistake that has been. He isn’t going to panic yet, although honestly he isn’t quite sure of what he is going to do. The last three times he has stolen glances at Elijah, those unearthly eyes have looked up to meet him. And now Elijah is walking over, across the set, ignoring the working crew who part and weave around him.

Dominic feels as if he can’t breathe, hot and cold at the same time, completely tongue-tied. Elijah stops in front of him and waits, smiling.

“Well?” he asks, teasing.

Dominic finds his voice. “I don’t want to love you,” he explains. “Just to be in love with you.” It doesn’t make much sense when said aloud, even to him, but Elijah just laughs.

“Too late,” he says, with all of the confidence in the world, and Dom realizes that he is right. He has slipped up and now he is falling, drowning in blue eyes and a gap-toothed smile.

Luckily, Elijah doesn’t seem to mind.


End file.
